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Tuesday, April 27, 2010

On any scale of significance, is the burning alive of a helpless dalit girl less important as a news story than the murky IPL concerning only the rich and influential? Why we are seeing the scandalous people every day on front pages and the girl’s murder by arrogant agents of state power relegated to oblivion?

Those who say they belong to a caste that’s higher than the other Hindus are fossils. Like Khap people. The real low caste are those who claim to be savarnas, or belonging to some kind of an upper caste. Who gave them this right to call themselves ‘upper’ and the others ‘lower’? Those who say they are ‘upper caste’, in reality belong to the lowest class of human values and they abuse their dharma, which they say is Hindu.

Hisar must anger this nation, which is deeply engrossed in the IPL mud. We have sham pillars of democracy that thrive on casteism and hot money. Valmikis (dalits), tribal and other marginalized segments together form the majority of this nation. Yet, they are pushed out of every higher decision-making forum. Either they are hated and kept at bay by a cartel of influential caste-based groups or patronized — "well, you see they have to be accommodated, SC ko to lena hi padega na ... mazboori hai". These are the clichés we often hear in the power corridors. So-called dalit leaders are fake. They either consolidate their base through the easy way of spreading poison for other castes, using bad and strong language and aligning with deadlier elements of Islamist groups who use them for undermining Hindu solidarity. None of them have ever been seen helping their community through better schools and providing healthcare and sanitation facilities in their areas. Most of them learn to climb the stairs of political happiness through subjugating the interests of their flock and licking the boots of the political patrons.I have seen an intrinsic hatred for the so-called low-caste people among the best of sermonizers who otherwise wax eloquent on the need of building a casteless society. I was abused, verbally assaulted by those who mattered just for taking up the cause of my Hindu brothers on the basis of what I have learnt in the RSS and hence got rid of my caste identity from my name. They, the all so-called fake high-caste conglomerate, would never allow a dalit girl’s burning taken up as a challenge to the Hindu society and discussed threadbare on channels and newspapers. Everywhere we see an abysmal absence of these segments, more so in the media. The channels, so passionately performing their duty on a Sania-Shoaib nikah or IPL-Tharoor masala, keep a studied silence with cursory mentions on issues of atrocities on dalits, especially on Valmikis.

In our daily life, the society intrinsically shows signs of hatred or at best aloofness from those whom we despicably refer to as scheduled castes and tribes. I know the arguments will be given how many extraordinary benefits these segments are receiving at the cost of the so-called higher castes. And even these castes have their poor who are forced to do menial jobs due to poverty. My only response to all these sham arguments is: "Try to live a day as an untouchable. Without friends in the circles that rule, be unlisted, ignored or patronized, always considered as ‘in becharon ko kuchh de do’ kind of people. Always blamed for the lethargic work in the offices and no-intelligence-just climbing up on crutches section. Then realize what it means to be a Valmiki. To be economically poor is bad. But to be poor and ‘untouchable’ is to be like a sub human. Choose."

The test of your large heartedness and all-inclusive behaviour lies in self-introspection and not in quoting religious books advocating harmony and equality. Don’t quote the Gita or the Ramayana to Valmikis, they know what is written in it and what is not practised by the eloquent preachers. Answer the following:

1. Have you ever tried to celebrate Diwali or Rakhi with those who are called ‘untouchables’?

2. In your list of personal invitees, how many of these can be considered as your friends and visit your place with family as frequently as ‘others’?

3. In a puja or a family celebration do these ‘untouchables’ ever sit with you and perform the rites with Panditji as naturally as ‘others’?

4. If your daughter wants to marry a person of her choice and that happens to be a Valmiki, would you approve or disapprove?

5. Have you ever tried to know how these segments that have been around you and your ancestors and were not treated as well as they should have been, live their lives? Like the safai karamchari, whom you see every day, and try to avoid a ‘touch’ with her? Do they send their children to as good schools as you afford? And then do you also join the chorus that the government has given them too many facilities and the only sin that you have committed is to belong to a ‘higher caste’?

6. Can you describe the thread or the element that makes you feel that you belong to some sort of a higher caste and these, the ‘other’ people to a lower caste”?

7. Do you feel that the present-day pandit system, the priests’ order, needs a refreshing change and let the pujaris be more learned, with a good knowledge of Sanskrit, must get higher and reasonably good offerings (dakshina) and also the Valmiki youth, well trained and groomed for the job, be inducted as priests in Haridwar and all other temples and pilgrim centres? Let the opportunity to rise in society through IT, medical education and also priesthood be open to all Hindu sections without any caste-based discrimination?

8. How many ashrams, centres of spiritual rejuvenation and religious retreats would have these Valmiki and tribal segments of the society as devotees and as equal participants? Does it bother you if you find they are scantily represented even if they outnumber your castes?

9. Would you feel encouraged to ask a question to these high-profile gurus and saints that how many times in the last 10 years have they been to a Valmiki basti or have addressed a congregation for these segments in tribal areas, bringing the dharma and culture’s contemporary faces and flow to such areas also?

10. Have you ever thought that those who were declared outcastes by our common ancestors deserve a better deal through you and lets visit their house to see their condition and extend a hand of friendship, just for the sake of it, even if no other help can be given, and this act will not be an act of charity but a proactive action on part of those ancestors of ours who must be regretting their illogical behavior?

No offence intended indeed. Just try to hear the last cries of the physically challenged girl for help who was burnt for no crime except that she belonged to a caste, which the tehsildar didn’t.

Now, the last word for this piece.

The solution: produce more dalit journalists.One of the better solutions to me is to help more and more youths from dalit and tribal segments to join mainstream journalism without the crutches of reservation. Have them trained in multimedia courses, through various schools of journalism. I am on board of a national university of journalism and can help. Even otherwise, would like to help as many young friends as possible through a specially crafted course and environment. I am sure friends will be there to help from all quarters. But at least it will do wonders to fill a very wide gap we see today. There is hardly any noticeable presence from these segments in our channels, editors' groups and media houses. Why? Try to find an answer without blaming them with a bullshit — oh, they don't come up on merit.

Friday, April 23, 2010

The Bharatiya Janata Party's mammoth rally in New Delhi this week signals Nitin Gadkari's arrival on the national stage, affirms BJP national spokesperson Tarun Vijay.

Nitin Gadkari has finally arrived. The success of the Bharatiya Janata Party rally against rising prices in New Delhi on April 21 has stamped a nod of approval on his acumen and leadership. BJP cadres agree that he has brought a whiff of fresh air into the party. A new life is being injected into the organisation.

Quite an achievement for someone who was being mocked at a couple of months ago with withering smiles and comments like, 'Will he be able to get votes for the party in Bihar or Jharkhand?'

Thousands of workers converging from far-off places like Okha and Port Blair, mingling with activists from Haryana, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh, can't be a matter of just collecting heads. It needs inspiration and a call from the heart. They travelled for days in the scorching heat. The participants outnumbered the earlier estimated figures. Gadkari has shaken the confidence of the ruling United Progressive Alliance

It is extraordinary for someone who till recently was considered a stranger on the national scene and was no more than a regional leader. The headcount at the rally has made sceptics in the BJP accept that Nitin Gadkari has mobilised his team and infused new confidence among the workers.

Politics is but a matter of moral authority and perception. Now is the time where the not-so-easy journey begins. The journey begins with great expectations, hopes and challenges within the party and the country.

With finesse, the organisational restructuring mission needs attention especially in areas where the electoral battle means a lot for the future.

Like Uttar Pradesh which has always been a strong base for the BJP since the days of its parent, the Jan Sangh. It has produced stalwarts like Deen Dayal Upadhyaya, Nanaji Deshmukh and Atal Bihari Vajpayee Why did the party lose it? Fresh initiatives and a paradigm shift are called for as that is too significant an issue to be taken lightly. Can a ruthless analysis be undertaken keeping the organisational prospects in focus?

UP presents a portrait of regional and petty community-based politics with enormous flow of money in building statues and road show combat as a disenchanted public watch helplessly. Poverty, backwardness, caste-based polity, acute water and power shortages, a hopeless rural economy and an anarchical state where the nexus between the corrupt politician and an equally compromising administration has made life difficult for the common person.

Should it be just a matter of enhancing party prospects or is there some social responsibility too going beyond the immediate gains to provide succour to the masses?

Political parties' ideologies should not be at the stake of their leaders who run organisation as their personal fiefdoms.

The issues of security, public health, education at affordable cost, ensuring water and power supply to the rural and urban populace, and, above all, building confidence in public institutions, have to be taken up at a priority. People are losing faith in political leaders and institutions. Fossilised organisations like the khap panchayats are taking the law in their hands reminding us of the old medieval barbarism while a new India is emerging on the world horizon that is bright and willing to conquer the world.

Is there a connect in these seemingly two ages?

Is there any party trying to capture their imagination and help them spread their wings further?

The communalisation of vote bank politics is another issue, which has a direct bearing on national security and the social fabric. It is only the BJP that speaks out boldly on such points advocating an equality of all Indian citizens before the law.

And to top it all the external threats from neighbouring countries, the Af-Pak geo-political scene and the foreign pressures on governance make the task more formidable for any national leader. The road for the BJP, hence, is not just to increase its organisational prowess north of the Vindhyas immediately and towards the south with new and out of box initiatives, it has also to power a pan-India vision.

India needs new enthusiasm, and a bold youthful energy unburdened with the prejudices of the past that takes Bharat beyond the faultlines of religious bigotry and caste-based discrimination. A tall order? Seemingly impossible? But then who says leaders must have a cakewalk.

Except the Congress and the BJP there are hardly any parties that have a pan-Indian outlook and presence. Ironically the Congress has become shackled in the family-controlled conglomerate so it is the BJP that has to succeed to nurture the roots of parliamentary democracy. It has shown that even a small boy from Nagpur who used to paste posters during elections can become its national president.

Nitin Gadkari's arrival on the national political scene must see new paradigms emerging, hopefully.

Tarun Vijay is also director, Dr Syama Prasad Mookerjee Research Foundation, New Delhi.

Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh has blamed 'Hindu hypocrisy and upper caste arrogance' for the recent arson in Gohana town of Haryana in which several Dalit houses were set ablaze.

'Even if we try to view the incident in Gohana, removed from the political angle, it reflects the hypocrisy of the Hindu society and the cheapness and arrogance, which goes against national interests, of the so-called upper castes,' Tarun Vijay, editor of RSS mouthpiece Panchjanya said in a write-up in the latest issue.

Maintaining that the incident was 'neither surprising nor new', he said the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in Haryana, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Rajasthan were victims of 'deep rooted hatred and neglect'.

'The so-called upper castes cover up all their misdeeds overtly and covertly through their fellow clansmen in the administration and media. Irrespective of parties and their colours, they are all alike when it comes to atrocities on the deprived sections,' it said.

Referring to the BJP's September 1 decision to send a 'fact-finding team' to Gohana, he said 'the incident took place on August 27. The houses were set on fire on August 31.

'The news dominated every newspaper and television channel but till now, we have not heard of a single important Hindu political or social leader having visited the area.'

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Shilpa Shetty vouched for the way Lalit Modi has been running the IPL. She said confidently: “It's perfectly fine.” What else do you need to know?

The Mallyas, the Shettys, the Khans and all those moneybags who are contributing a lot to help India’s economy grow on Malabar Hills must come forward with sugarcane barons to help a hapless "bechara" like Lalit Modi and, of course, Shashi Tharoor. They are BPL people. Below "Paap-Punya" Line . Nothing touches them except the lucre. And they think, as Shilpa was trying to tell us, they help the economy grow to help another set of BPLs, that is, those Below Poverty Line. Now, if we have to have a Shilpa as our conscience keeper and certifier of good conduct, then let the Dantewada tribals eat cake if they don’t have "roti".

Having covered the Indian political scene as a journalist for the last three decades, I know it’s almost impossible to find a middle-class Indian who can qualify as a friend of our politicians. Most of our politicians are happy to receive those who arrive at their bungalows in BMWs and Mercs and take care of their "domestic" needs. Those who come from far-off places to give their applications prepared after putting in long hours of labour never know that their letters of hope are often assigned to the dustbin as soon as they are heard and disposed of in the outer room, adjacent to the office reception. The rich are treated in the cozy "baithak", or the "drawing room" as the brown sahebs prefer to call it.

The so-called fight against the Naxalites or the drive to develop tribal areas too has a side story, bigger than the principal one. I worked as an activist in a tribal area, Dadra Nagar Haveli, for five years, helping establish a hostel and school and encouraging tribal solidarity against exploitation by the rich and the urban elite. It was a journey that taught me to be intensely angry with the so-called highly placed and arrogant people who would do everything possible to subjugate or at the other extreme patronize the people they should be walking with as pals. It was a hopeless struggle. Politicians, even among those who were their own kith and kin, would learn the tricks of deceit and making hot money once they were "Delhi returned". They themselves became exploiters and managed industrialists and land seekers, turning their offices into virtual commission agencies to facilitate the conversion of agricultural land into a non-agricultural.

It is this hiatus where the Tharoors and the Lalit Modis come in and get entrenched. Tharoor was a darling of India’s neorich glitterati. His accented expressions and the "just-right body language" distanced him from the teeming millions of the Indian language-speaking Bharat and brought him closer to the Gurgaonised Twitterati. He was given space in the print line media, which would never be given to a representative of Bharat that is not India. He fell.

My sympathies are with him. The big fish, as usual, are still there to be brought into the net and the stink called IPL needs to be probed by an "I don’t care for the consequences" type, like Seshan or Gopalaswami.

Those who show the courage to jump off a cliff and not just inch their way to wealth make the life of a nation. The men and women who lead the masses must choose between the life of a Man Singh, amassing forts and billions but no glory, and a Rana Pratap, living a rugged existence amid the rocks of Haldighati with pride and spine.

The IPL mess must be addressed in its proper perspective. Look at the scales of liquid they swim in: “£2m bets in UK, Rs 5000cr in India on IPL”. No such gutter of easy money would exist if politicians were not behind it. They mock at the 40% of Indian population that’s forced to live at Rs 20 a day, while the satraps of the stinking sultanate have Rs 2,000 per plate salad. It’s here that some against these goons justify the gun. And to top it all, our information age is divided between a semiliterate media’s glamour boys and the cosmetic damsels of Naxal-land who ink and blink for Anglo-Saxon evening players.

They never try to figure out why only the tribal regions of the nation are under a spell of insurgency, terrorism, anti-national movements and above all an isolating darkness. They never raise the question why even after three decades of a so-called armed revolution not a single place can be found where the dreamy-eyed butchers of literature that glorifies Maoism can show a good hospital or school, increased farm production and growing happiness index under the gun-regime of the Maoists.

That's the first dishonesty of the "red revolutionaries". True, there is the other side to the story too. So what? Can that justify brutality and barbarism?

I know from my own experience in tribal areas that the biggest curse a man can face is to be alone and unlisted. Tribals and the poor of India have been made to feel like that. Don’t look at their political leaders who might be among the richest in India. They neither represent the tribes nor their land. The irony is that a large section, often improperly called the mainstream Indian media, has become an agent of the urban rich and politically influential class for reasons of business.

With the pillars of democratic institutions under suspicion and a corrupt polity, is there a chance for the rural and tribal poor to hope for any succour?

MNREAGA? Ha!!

Through erecting statues or the garlanding of a dalit leader? Spending a night in a properly set village house? Just take a glance at some of the statistics: 700 tribes form 8.2% of India. They are spread over 15% of the geographical area of the land. More than 51% are below poverty line; 47.10% is the average literacy rate with just 34.76 % female literacy rate. They have commonalities with the non-tribal rural poor and this all would show that more than half of India is reeling under abject dehumanised conditions of living while a handful of politicians and IPL-cast leaders are living like viceroys. These are the sultans who give the call "Please make the Commonwealth Games success; it’s a question of our izzat". This was the heading of a piece penned by a leader of the ruling elite. Izzat? Whose izzat do the Commonwealth Games represent, anyway, of Her Majesty the Queen’s or of the formerly colonized subject classes?

Their Izzat is not hurt when 40% of India lives at Rs 20 a day and thousands in Delhi do not have roof over their heads and spend their night on the footpaths of Connaught Place.

Their millions are protected by the Mallyas, the Shettys and the Pawars. Who is going to protect the millions who can never even dream of having a TV set to watch the "magic" called IPL?

Monday, April 19, 2010

The governance was never so fatigued. Led by unwilling, hesitant, ready-to-resign, tired and moist cartridges that end up taking a potshot at each other through signed newspaper columns. The irony is, this "secular" dispensation is working wonderfully to make people more and more faithful and believe in some divine power, which must be wondering why this billion-strong nation cannot produce some leaders who take responsibility.

Our Prime Minister had a nice dinner, the most luxurious one Obama had given to any one, last time and this time he happily lapped up the sermons of a lady in love with Pakistan ostensibly wearing the burden to make two school going kids to behave in a nuke jungle. We didn’t even murmur against the completely unacceptable arrogance of Washington. We didn’t have to talk to Pakistan, the mother of all terrorism, without getting a foolproof assurance that it won’t support terrorists against us. Yet we began unilaterally a dialogue process only to be red-faced at the end of it. Why? Yielding to external pressures is a sure sign of fatigue and a resigned mood.

We don’t need to have their nuclear reactors, never used by the seller country for the last 50 years and we can met our energy requirements with solar, hydroelectric and thermal power plants. Yet we are buying the US reactors. We don t have to yield to the US to ink a civil nuclear responsibility bill, so insultingly drafted against our people. Yet we are pushing it. We were not obliged to send our foreign minister for a Beijing trip – to inaugurate a festival commemorating 60 years of bilateral diplomatic ties unless their prime minister had assured an appointment, a normal courtesy extended to a friendly country’s foreign minister. Last time too Pranab Mukherjee came back with a long face without meeting any high-ranking leader worth India’s status. Yet S M Krishna went on his first visit to China as minister for external affairs with a bang created through his XP division and returned without even a whimper.

Fatigued policy makers. Tired and confused itinerary providers. Fatigued and myopic statue builders. Who are so unsure about their popularity that they love to build their own memorials lest their followers forget to do so when they are gone. Fatigued warriors yawn to get permission to garland stone statues and conveniently forget the living soldiers who died for the cause of democracy and constitution. This silence of the dynasty, otherwise too vocal on poor and women’s empowerment and MNREAGA, is deadlier than the Maoist bullets. Look at the public condemnation of his pal Chidambaram by Digvijay Singh in a signed article. The chips would fall in their place.

Could a Congressman like Digvijay have the courage to criticize his own home minister publicly without the blessings and the tacit approval of 10 Janpath?

Signs of yawning and fatigued governance, which can't, look beyond the small time games. And such dangerous ones at that. Making a political "pilgrimage" to the homes of the terrorists in Azamgarh was one, then the other was to keep eyes wide shut at the cannibalistic celebration at the factory that produced largest number of Naxalites and their cohorts, JNU, on hearing the news of the killing of 65 jawans by Maoists. How can a government, if it means governance, tolerate such a grave insult to state power? The students who celebrated the death of the soldiers should have been booked with Kasab and tried for treason.

Instead the whole issue has been put under the carpet and campaign Uttar Pradesh is in full swing for reasons known to all. Here is the nation shrunk to the vote box. Boundaries shrunk to the domains to be "conquered". What about the rest of the nation and the larger issues of security and an equitable distribution of economic opportunities and wealth?

The state bonded to a party’s loss and profits prospect and the opponents being unfairly treated as has been in the cases of Uttarakhand and Himachal recently where the sanctioned plan outlays were withdrawn or cancelled. Only fatigued and the disinterested governors can afford to be so careless and callous towards their own countrymen.

The other example simply reminds us why we lost Somnath to Ghazni in 1024. Hang the man you hate most to placate the black goddess of sham secularism if you can. But to keep silence and feel pleasure at a foreign delegation insulting your own countryman, without any rhyme or reason except that of an intense hatred, is a crime as was committed by the back stabbers during the resistance war against Ghazni.

Only a fatigued and defocused government can have no strength to protest and answer appropriately the continued incursions by a mischievous neighbour. The soldiers who are asked to defend the frontiers are ill equipped. Nothing moves till a couple of accidents like that of Dantewara occur. At any critical moment, when the enemies find us unprepared, the chinks are exposed as we saw in 1962 and on 26/11. Should we allow that again? Aren’t the people as much responsible for allowing bad governance as much as the bad governors are responsible for the atrociously unacceptable state of affairs?